From slave to star: Actor Brad Pitt bringing Solomon Northup story to the big screen

SARATOGA SPRINGS -- Brad Pitt will star in a movie about one of the most famous figures in Spa City history.

Solomon Northup, a free-born black man, was lured from Saratoga Springs, sold into slavery and later rescued, an incredible story of human endurance, bravery and perseverance.

His autobiography, "Twelve Years a Slave," is the title of a film slated for release in 2013, co-produced by Plan B Entertainment. Pitt is one of the firm's principal owners.

"We're still trying to get everything up and running," a spokesperson at Plan B said. "It's still in pre-production."

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No details are available about when or where filming will take place and if local sites will be used, the spokesperson said.

"I'm so thrilled that this movie is happening," said Johnnie Roberts, Saratoga Springs Visitor Center program coordinator. "It's very important that the story be told. What's uncommon is that the person to whom it happened was able to win his freedom and document his experience. It shed light on the issue."

Roberts organizes annual "Solomon Northup Day" activities held each July at the Visitor Center. The event was founded by Renee Moore of Saratoga Springs.

It's unknown what role Pitt will play. The movie will be directed by Steve McQueen of Great Britain (not related to the late, famous actor) and will star London-born actor Chiwetel Ejiofor as Northup.

Saratoga Springs has a long relationship with the silver screen, from classics such as "Saratoga" (starring Clark Gable, 1937) and "Saratoga Trunk" (starring Gary Cooper, 1945) to "Billy Bathgate" (starring Nicole Kidman, 1991). But no major productions have been filmed here since "The Horse Whisperer" (starring Robert Redford, 1998).

"It would be great to have them here," said Annamarie Bellantoni, Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce vice president for tourism. "It's a great economic development impact. You want people to come and stay, use room nights and get caterers."

However, the chamber hasn't had any inquiries from anyone involved with the Northup project, she said.

"I think it's critical that some part of it is filmed here," Roberts said. "The story needs to be em-braced as a Saratoga story."

Free from his birth -- in Minerva -- Northup lived in and was married at the present-day Old Fort House Museum in Fort Edward on Christmas Day in 1829. He worked on the Champlain Canal at the time.

Later, he followed his wife to Saratoga Springs, where she worked in one of the city's large, old hotels. Northup, a skilled violinist, was approached in 1841 by two men who claimed to be circus promoters offering a job with their show. He went to New York and then Washington, D.C., where he was kidnapped, sold as a slave and wound up on a Louisiana plantation.

His road back to freedom began when a Canadian carpenter, Samuel Bass, showed up at the farm. Northup, who had been to Canada as a canal worker, recognized Bass's regional accent. Although hesitant at first, Northup told Bass about various towns and cities in the North, convincing Bass that he'd been illegally abducted.

The two scheduled a clandestine meeting among high weeds on the banks of a bayou.

"I gave him the names of William Perry, Cephas Parker and Judge Marvin, all of Saratoga Springs," Northup said in his autobiography, a narrative told to David Wilson. "I had been em-ployed by the latter in the United States Hotel."

Perry, Parker and Marvin owned a store on Washington Street.

Bass found at least one of them and Solomon's plight was relayed to Henry B. Northup, the son of a white judge, for whom Solomon's father once worked. "It was common for black servants to take the name of their employer," Roberts said.

Henry B. Northup put papers together documenting Solomon's status as a free man. He then traveled to Louisiana and won his release, right from the field he was laboring in.

Last month, National Geographic released a new children's book about Solomon Northup's life story. "We get calls about this from all over the country, more than any other topic," Roberts said. "It brings people to Saratoga who are on a specific quest. It's a story about the triumph of the human spirit."

Strangely, however, no one knows what happened to Northup after his return North.